Amidst the new age of streamer gaming – where kids who grew up watching FaZe Clan on YouTube now want to become their idols and dominate every multiplayer lobby of (mostly) Shooter games while streaming on Twitch – games don’t feel fun anymore. Gone are the days when you can hop on your favourite Shooter to kick back and relax, as nowadays you are competing with 16-year-olds who are playing casual lobbies in hopes of getting into eSports. All sense of community in this online sphere has dissipated in recent years, leaving us with no place to connect with people on a deeper level.

Enter Webfishing, an online social hub born from “west”, an indie developer in Michigan, which is slowly taking the casual gaming world by storm. Currently sitting with a peak of just above 24,000 concurrent players, this niche corner of the internet has garnered a loving, tight-knit community, all dedicated to – you guessed it – fishing. While everyone is casting their rods into either sea or freshwater, they have a chance to chat with others on servers of up to 12 people, under the guise of their avatar – kittens or dogs wearing silly little attire of their own customisation.

If you ever get bored of fishing – how you could, I have no idea as there are close to 100 unique fish to catch – you could spend your time perfecting your online avatar, making chalk art or even learning to play guitar, by creating chords to play with a set of reactive strings to truly play what your heart desires. Hell, I’ve come across someone who would play Radiohead’s “Weird Fishes / Arpeggi” to keep us company on Webfishing’s docks while expressing our favourite tunes to listen to on gloomy days, a true testament to Webfishing being a modern-day third space.

I was introduced to Webfishing through a friend of mine, who gifted the game to me via Steam (Shoutout to Gino). Since then I frequent Webfishing on occasion, hanging out (and catching humongous fish) with some of the nicest people I have met in recent years online. With a simple, but addictive, gameplay loop, this game feels like a breath of fresh air in the current gaming landscape plagued with unfinished projects and microtransactions – shady business practices that large, greedy game devs often utilise – which Webfishing is devoid of.

When you join a server, you are put beside a cabin area, which serves as the main hub area where you are greeted by other members. From there the world is yours (more like an island, but still pretty nonetheless). People spend their time on the benches of a small dam in the middle of the island or gathering and having parties on one of the two docks. Alternatively, if fishing is not your style (not too sure as to why you wouldn’t be), you can partake in metal detecting or some light scratch card gambling with the money you were supposed to use on buying bait.

It doesn’t stop there however, as there’s lots to explore on this beautiful, low-poly island, with little ponds here and there, large blue mushrooms littered throughout the space, and footpaths that connect each point of interest in Webfishing. Inside the cabin I mentioned earlier, there are two characters with whom you can trade your hard-earned cash for some nifty accessories, clothes and fishing gear. With lots of upgrades you can get for your setup – including frogs in buckets that fish for you – becoming the ultimate (Web) fisher isn’t far from a pipe dream anymore.

Webfishing also boasts a low barrier of entry graphically, and it can even run on your crusty, old Thinkpad laptop – truly nothing big is stopping you from joining the community. Initially released in 2022 on Itch, a platform for indie developers to post their projects, the game was remade for Steam and released in October 2024.

Definitely give Webfishing a try, and find some new online mates to get along with! Sitting at only R52 on Steam with an Overwhelmingly Positive rating from over 48,000 users, “west” has cultivated a Queer-friendly and positive audience who lovingly embraces new members with open arms.